EDITORIAL: Corbett's record on women's issues needs more results

Delaware County, it seems, has suddenly become Gov. Tom Corbett’s favorite place to hang out. The 64-year-old western Pennsylvania Republican, who barely made an appearance in this part of the state during his first run for governor, has now visited Delaware County about six times since November — including four times in the last two months.

His newfound ubiquity in the area is not surprising. The governor himself said he needed to be more visible in the region in his run for re-election, especially since Delaware County was one of four Pennsylvania counties that did not back him in 2010.

With polls consistently ranking him the most vulnerable incumbent in the country, because just one in four registered voters polled said he deserves another term, every appearance counts.

Corbett’s latest occasion to visit Delaware County was to launch ”Women for Corbett-Cawley,” a “women’s coalition” that is supposed to garner grass-roots support for the incumbent and his lieutenant governor.

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According to his wife, Susan, who also was at the Towne House restaurant in Media to announce the formation of the coalition, Corbett is “a champion of women in the work force” because he has women heading some state agencies.

But how much of a champion is the governor to the rest of his female constituents?

Corbett refuses to tap a rich funding source for education and other budget items by not taxing his friends in the oil industry who are fracking Marcellus Shale for natural gas. Pennsylvania is the only oil-producing state in the nation without a severance tax, a Corbett policy that frustrates both Republican and Democratic state legislators.

Corbett has also refused to accept an estimated $3.3 billion in federal Medicaid expansion funds made available through the Affordable Care Act that would have helped prevent a half million Pennsylvanians from falling into the health care coverage gap. Many of them are working women who earn too much to qualify for traditional Medicaid but not enough to buy into the federal Health Insurance Marketplace. Most assuredly they don’t see the governor as their hero.

And what about Pennsylvania lesbians in long-term relationships who, unlike same-sex couples in surrounding states, have been unable to wed because of Corbett’s insistence on enforcing an 18-year-old state ban on same-sex marriage? In fact, he equated it with incest in a TV interview last year, then quickly recanted when taken to task for the comment.

Just as offensive to women was his remark at a March 2012 news conference in reference to his support of mandatory ultrasounds for women considering abortions. Said the governor: “I’m not making anybody watch, OK. Because you just have to close your eyes. As long as it’s on the exterior and not the interior.”

Last Thursday Corbett told a group of presumably Republican women assembled at the Towne House, “We need your help.” He charged them with educating voters “about what we really have done.”

Therein lies the challenge.

Whether it comes from the mouths of males or females, Tom Corbett hasn’t done much to crow about. He certainly is no champion of women.